The Chinese word 大清早 is constructed from three characters: 大 (dà), meaning 'big' or 'great'; 清 (qīng), meaning 'clear' or 'pure'; and 早 (zǎo), meaning 'early' or 'morning.' The characters 清 and 早 combine to form 清早, which refers to early morning, and 大 is added as an intensifier to emphasize the earliness, resulting in a term that denotes the very early part of the morning, such as dawn.